Live Review: Gary Moore, Hammersmith Odeon, 11th May, 1990

BLUES IS THE COLOUR

It's very difficult to ascertain why Gary Moore has never gained true commercial recognition as a solo artist. As a guitarist, though, he has exceeded all expectations! Personally I regard him as one of the best rock guitarists on the face of the planet!

Gary's a man of many hidden musical secrets. One moment you'll catch him playing spellbinding, power-crunching heavy metal; the next he'll be so melodic, so inspiring! The blues are his roots! Roots that breat-fed the likes of Led Zeppelin, Free, Deep Purple, and of course Moore's old band Thin Lizzy. It's no wonder then why Gary feels so at home with his playing tonight! His Still Got The Blues album has given him a new lease of life that was much needed.

From the moment he walks on stage to the moment he walks off at the end he just plays! plays! plays! The later additions of guitarists Albert Collins and 'the velvet bulldozer' Albert King enhances this interplay even further. Oh Pretty Woman blasts out of its shell live, while the soul-stirring title track Still Got The Blues sends a shiver down your spine! Indeed much of the album is aired and there's virtually nothing played from Moore's back catalogue, except the closing instrumental which appeared on his '89 solo album After The War. In all honesty the whole show was one long blues jam although the moods did change.

At least the Irish guitarist has found something that provides a perfect musical platform for his skillful playing. Tonight the star of the show wasn't Gary Moore, it wasn't Albert King, it wasn't Albert Collins. It was the electric guitar!

One of the best shows this year by far! What more can I say? Number one in this month's RIFF RAFF top ten - Well done Gazza!

Mark Crampton
Riff Raff
June, 1990

Revenge...?

Riff Raff was a legendary rock magazine based in London in the late 1980s and 1990s. Edited by the ultimate music biz insider, Mark Crampton, and employing such talents as Mark Blake, Jerry Ewing, Mike Harris, Paul Smith, Chris Collingwood, Alan McCrorie, Simon Robinson, Lyn Guy, Anna Marx, Nick Douglas, Marion Garden, Peter "Grunty" Grant, Joe "The Crow" Mackett, Billy "The Kluck" Kulke, and, lastest and mostest, the incredible Liddell Brothers, Mark (a.k.a. "El Perro") and Colin (a.k.a. "Der Fly"). Unfortunately, Riff Raff was just too R n' R for its own good. A genuine working class rock mag, written, edited, and translated into 16 European languages in a drug-N-Jack-D-fuelled haze, often on the back of motorbikes, with spell checking by our staff of attentive rock bimbos (chosen purely for their blondeness and big knockers), it soon fell behind more trainspotterly, nerdish, and politically correct publications like Q, Kerrang, Mojo, Metal Hammer, and Horse & Hound. This website is an archive and kind of shrine dedicated to the writing of its greatest writers, some of whom, luckily for the Rock Kosmos, still continue to write about music. This is the REVENGE of Riff Raff...Rock on!